It is all about the words!

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American English has been enriched by the widespread adoption of words based on vocabulary of Native American tribes, including the many tribes that spoke (and, in some cases, still speak) one of the Algonquian languages of what is now eastern North America. The following is a list of such terms, more or less commonly used, most of which refer to animals or plants or products derived from them.

apishamore (Algonquian): a buffalo-hide saddle blanketbabiche (Míkmaq): a leather or sinew thong or threadcaribou (Míkmaq): a species of large antlered mammalcaucus (Algonquian): a group of people who meet to discuss an issue or work together toward a goal; also a verbchipmunk (Odawa): any of various small rodent species that are part of the squirrel familychinquapin (Powhatan): a dwarf chestnut tree or its nutcisco (Ojibwe): a whitefishhackmatack (Algonquian): a type of larch tree, or its woodhickory (Powhatan): a type of tree or its wood, or a cane or switch made of the woodhominy (Powhatan): soaked and hulled corn kernelshusky (based on shortening of the Cree word from which Eskimo is derived): a type of dog; the adjective husky is unrelatedkinkajou (Algonquian): a Central and South American mammalkinnikinnick (or killikinnick or killickinnick) (Unami Delaware): a mixture of dried leaves and bark smoked like tobacco, or the plant (also called bearberry) from which the materials are takenmackinaw (Menomini): a heavy type of cloth used for coats and blankets, or a coat or blanket made of the cloth, or a type of troutmoccasin (Algonquian): a soft leather shoe or a regular shoe resembling a traditional moccasin, or, as “water moccasin,” a species of snake or a similar snakemoose (Eastern Abenaki): a species of large antlered mammalmugwump (Eastern Abenaki): originally, a war leader, but in American slang, a kingpin, later a political independent, or someone neutral or undecidedmuskellunge (Ojibwe): a pike (a type of fish)muskeg (Cree): a bog or swampmuskrat (Western Abenaki): an aquatic rodentopossum (Powhatan): a marsupial (sometimes possum)papoose (Narragansett): an infantpecan (Illinois): a type of tree, or the wood or the nut harvested from itpemmican (Cree): a food made of pounded meat and melted fat, and sometimes flour and molasses as wellpersimmon (Powhatan): a type of tree, or the fruit harvested from itpipsissewa (Abenaki): a type of herb with leaves used for tonic and diuretic purposespokeweed (Powhatan): a type of herbpone (Powhatan): flat cornbread; also called cornpone, which is also slang meaning “countrified” or “down-home”)powwow (Narragansett): a Native American medicine man, or, more commonly, a Native American ceremony, fair, or other gathering; also, slang for “meeting” or, less often, “party”puccoon (Powhatan): a type of plant, or the pigment derived from itpung (Algonquian): a box-shaped sleigh drawn by one horsepunkie (Munsee): an alternate name for a biting midge, a type of flyquahog (Narragansett): a type of edible clamQuonset hut (Algonquian): a trademark for a type of prefabricated structure with an arched corrugated-metal roofraccoon (Powhatan): a type of mammal noted for its masklike facial markings, or the fur of the animalsachem (Algonquian): a chief of a Native American tribe or confederation of tribes; also, a leader in the Tammany Hall political machinesagamore (Eastern Abenaki): an Algonquian tribal chiefshoepac (Unami Delaware): a cold-weather laced bootskunk (Massachusett): a type of mammal known for spraying a noxious odor in defense, or the fur of the animal; also, slang for “obnoxious person”squash (Narragansett): any of various plants that produces fruit, also called squash, that is cultivated as a vegetable; the verb squash, and the name of the ball-and-racquet game, are unrelatedsquaw (Massachusetts): a Native American woman or, by extension, a woman or a wife; the word is widely considered offensivesuccotash (Narragansett): a dish of green corn and lima or shell beansterrapin (Powhatan): one of various types of turtlestoboggan (Míkmaq): a wooden sled with the front end curved up and, by extension, a downward course or a sharp decline (the activity of using such a sled is called tobogganing); also, a slang term for a winter stocking cap with a pom-pom or a tasseltomahawk (Powhatan): a light ax used as a throwing or hacking weapon; as verb, it means “use a tomahawk”totem (Ojibwe): an object, usually an animal or plant, serving as a family or clan emblem, or, more often, a carved or painted representation, often in the form of a pole fashioned from a tree trunk and carved with figures representing one’s ancestors (also, a family or clan so represented); by extension, any emblem or symboltuckahoe (Powhatan): a type of plant with an edible root, or the edible part of a type of fungustullibee (Ojibwe): any one of several types of whitefishwampum (Massachusett): beads of polished shells used as ceremonial gifts, money, or ornaments; also, slang for “money”wanigan (Ojibwa): a tracked or wheeled shelter towed by a tractor or mounted on a boat or raftwapiti Shawnee): another word for elkwickiup (Fox): a hut or shelter made of a rough frame of vegetationwigwam (Eastern Abenaki): a hut or shelter made of a rough frame of vegetation or hideswoodchuck (Algonquian): a type of marmot (a small mammal); also called a groundhog

About a week ago, an ALA colleague popped into my office with an epiphany. “Libraries will never die out. You know why? If they didn’t exist, people would be inventing them.” As you might imagine, that got us to talking and finding examples—and it certainly wasn’t hard. Little Free Libraries, anyone? They are springing up all over, and have certainly captured the imagination of the mainstream media, as several issues of American Libraries Direct have recently attested. When you think about it, as AL’s Librarian’s Library columnist Karen Muller has, the Occupy libraries movement sprung from the same human need to share ideas, and often there’s no better vehicle for that than the written word.

In fact, the human need for a library has even prompted the creation of ALA Fact Sheet #16: “Setting Up a Library.”

Karen was on a roll, for she then proceeded to pinpoint, in crystal-clear terms, the heart of the problem with ebooks: “Sharing is antithetical to ebooks.” In one sentence, she had deconstructed arguments over licensing models, pricing schemes, royalties, and copyright protections—the proponents of which defend as the only means of protecting the livelihoods of authors and bottom lines of publishers. But what about simple word of mouth as a means of increasing interest in a title and, ultimately, sales? Brick-and-mortar booksellers do it all the time in a time-honored tradition known as hand-selling. (Yes, so does Amazon with its “You might also like” app, if you don’t mind having your reading tastes second-guessed by an algorithm.) Libraryland’s version of hand-selling, of course, is called readers’ advisory, and benefits authors as well as publishers. If you doubt that, ask David Guterson, who credits librarians and booksellers alike for making his first novel, Snow Falling on Cedars, a bestseller, and him the recipient of the 1995 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.

There’s no question that reading enthusiasts are also sharing enthusiasts and it’s inconvenient at best to share a copyrighted ebook with a friend when the only way to do it is to lend your friend your entire portable library, or e-reader, so she can enjoy that one title you want to recommend. No wonder physical libraries continue to capture the public’s imagination, along with their contents.

So it should come as no surprise that, even as the people of Athens, Vermont, voted to disband their taxpayer-funded 117-year-old public library at a March 6 Town Meeting, they simultaneously made provisions for the town to set aside space in which to launch a new library when economic difficulties ease. Library booster Dolly Stevens switched roles in mid-meeting from saving the existing library to opening a volunteer-staffed library of some 4,000 books donated to her for the interim, reported the March 7 Brattleboro Reformer.

In Evanston, Illinois, where the Friends of the Library fought long and hard to keep the South branch open but ultimately lost the battle with the city council, the Friends are celebrating the first anniversary of their makeshift volunteer-run replacement, the Mighty Twig branch. The announcement this month that Chicago Public Library’s First Deputy Commissioner Karen Danczak Lyons would become the director of Evanston Public Library and that the board was being given fiscal autonomy seems to auger well for the Mighty Twig eventually to be splinted back onto the taxpayer-funded branch system.

Branch hours for such hard-hit systems as Indianapolis–Marion County Public Library, Santa Barbara (Calif.) Public Library, and Phoenix (Ariz.) Public Library either have been partially restored or seem on their way to expanding. These steps forward wouldn’t be possibilities if it weren’t for the perseverance of grassroots support—and that culture of sharing that libraries embody.

Take heed, ebook creators: You may not be holding quite as many cards in this high-stakes accessibility game as you think.